1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a document processing technique of processing a document file for bookbinding.
2. Description of the Related Art
Digital multifunctional peripherals are recently gaining more complex functions and can now implement bookbinding methods such as case binding that are conventionally specialties of commercial printing. A paper insertion function even enables printing including front cover, interleaf, tab sheet, and z-folding.
POD (Print On Demand) using a digital multifunctional peripheral is also becoming popular, and document reception using electronic document files is increasing recently.
Against this backdrop, various programs for efficiently inputting print instructions to a digital multifunctional peripheral have been developed.
More specifically, application programs for systematically performing page operations in an electronic document file, print format setting, and document input to a digital multifunctional peripheral have been developed. A printer driver used to input a print instruction from a document creation application program such as Microsoft Office or Acrobat of Adobe Systems to a digital multifunctional peripheral is designed to be able to set a print format.
Some electronic document files created by such a variety of programs contain data to be printed on the protruding tabs of tab sheets. Techniques of causing an application program or a printer driver to print data on the protruding tabs of tab sheets are also proposed (e.g., Japanese Patent Laid-Open No. 2005-014251).
In the above-described conventional technique, however, when an electronic document file containing data to be printed on the protruding tabs of tab sheets is received, it is difficult to output the data in an optimum form after page operations and print format setting.
A detailed example will be described. FIG. 33 is a view showing an example of an electronic document file containing in advance data to be printed on the protruding tabs of tab sheets. An electronic document file (to be referred to as tab document data hereinafter) 3301 contains data to be printed on the protruding tabs of tab sheets. Data 3302 is printed on a protruding tab. An electronic document file 3303 is not a file for a tab sheet. As a characteristic feature of the tab document data, its size is larger by the tab width (3304).
FIG. 34 is a view showing a state in which the electronic document file shown in FIG. 33 is read out by an application program. Reference numeral 3401 denotes a main window of the application program. A menu tool bar 3402 is used to use the functions of the application program. An icon 3403 represents a print format set state.
A tree view 3404 represents a page (book, chapters, and pages) configuration in the application program. A region 3405 displays a page preview in the application program.
Reference numeral 3406 represents a preview of a page complying with the print format in the application program. Page 1 previews tab document data printed on a tab sheet. This also applies to pages 4 and 7.
When the second chapter (pages 4 to 6) is deleted in this state, the pages of the third chapter move to the position of the second chapter. At this time, the tab document data of page 7 is printed on the tab sheet of the second chapter, and the tab print position shifts from the protruding tab created in advance.
FIG. 35 is a view showing a state in which the second chapter in FIG. 34 is deleted. A page tree view 3501 represents a page configuration after deletion of the second chapter. Reference numeral 3502 represents a preview of the tab document data of the third chapter printed on the tab sheet of the second chapter. The tab document data of the third chapter is created such that it is printed on the third protruding tab. On the tab sheet of the second tab, the data which should be printed on the protruding tab cannot be printed.
That is, when an electronic document file containing in advance data to be printed on protruding tabs is received, and page operations are then performed via an application program, data to be printed on protruding tabs cannot be printed. In this case, the data to be printed on protruding tabs needs to be created again using a document creation application program, resulting in a decrease in the operation efficiency.